Christmas time is nearing, and we warm up our hearts and get ready to help our neighbors. Churches and laymen’s organizations organize free Christmas-eve suppers for the poor or homeless, sell candles for Christmas help and many families offer money, food, clothes or toys to families, who suffer because of unemployment or other ill fate. Charity has a tradition in Poland, over 800-years’ long. But the custom of giving shouldn’t be a once-a-year act of kindness.

When I go think back to my first years of the professional work, I often recall my boss at the Foreign Language Broadcasts of Polish Radio. His name was Jan Klimek, and he was the Esperanto Desk chief at the radio. A university graduate - then becoming an editor, journalist and writer – Jan came from a very poor Polish peasant’s family. He used to tell us how he had to share a pair of shoes with his brother and to walk several miles to his primary school in another village, with a slice of bread with sugar instead of butter. I also think of my grandpa – Michael Jamrosz - who left his village home at the age of 7 to go to an elementary school at the nearby town of Sniatyn in Eastern Poland (now Ukraine). He used to sleep in cabins or barns and earned for food by carrying water buckets to peasants or town-dwellers. Later on, when his exceptional talent for math was discovered, Michael received a scholarship and his sponsors (one of them his math teacher) helped him to graduate from school and to go on to university. All that happened at the end of the 19^th and at the beginning of the 20^th century. In free Poland, after 1918, my grandpa became a teacher and a math professor himself, he could afford a big apartment and paid for his two daughters’ university education (one of them my late mother Barbara).

Both Jan and Michael, who had suffered poverty in their youth, became well-to-do citizens later in life. What I really liked in both of them was their sympathy for the poor and under-privileged and their readiness to offer help. This quality distinguished them and earned for them the respect of their fellow citizens.

Eighty five years after the re-establishment of an independent Polish State in 1918, and 14 years after the freeing of Poland from communist rule, we still face the problems of poverty, unemployment, and lack of economic and social equality. About one third of all Polish children are deprived of their safe and happy childhood because of the difficult economic situation of their families. Many children go to school hungry and eat their only warm meal there. Not only at Christmas, but also at Easter and Children’s Day, many charity organizations and individuals offer children free meals. It’s a shame that the state can’t afford to do that. But that’s a fact. On top of this, free education from elementary school to university becomes a myth or just a worthless chapter in the Constitution, with no financial warrant.

Therefore, more and more duties – from feeding poor children at school to paying for their education – are transferred from the once “omnipotent” state to active citizen groups.

There were 50,000 non-profit organizations active in Poland in 1997. The category comprises religious and secular associations, foundations and philanthropic alliances, but also political parties, trade unions, organizations of economic and professional self-governance, and church-related social institutions. There are more than 3,000 foundations, over 36,000 associations and social organizations (including voluntary fire-fighting units), and 900 church organizations. This is a passage from a report of the Academy of the Development of Philanthropy in Poland.

A part of the activity of these organizations and institutions is a scholarship program for children, young people, students. In fact, there are many such programs, with tens of thousands of donors and sponsors. The latest developments, after 1989, are Community Foundations – not unknown in pre-war Poland. The first such foundation was established in Cleveland, Ohio in 1914, initiated by a banker, Frederick Harris Goff. Now there are many of such Community Foundations in Poland. They also distribute scholarships to school children and students. For instance, a Community Foundation in Bilgoraj offered 60 scholarships to local children in 2002/2003. The individual sums of money are relatively small – 40 or 50 Polish zlotys per month – but matter in the budgets of poor families. An other program “Agrafka” offers more money (200 PLN monthly) to talented children.

These are only a few examples of the social (not state-sponsored) help to children and young people in Poland. The system of Community Foundations is very well developed throughout the whole country. After Poland’s inception into the European Union (May 1, 2004), Polish children and young people in general will be eligible for many funds, sponsored by the Union. But the number of people in need is much greater than the present state and social possibilities. People who are better off and think of the future of their homeland come up with individual projects to help people in need. In November, a Polish version of the popular American monthly Reader’s Digest [“Reader’s Digest – Przeglad”] wrote about a Polish farmer’s family who offered private scholarships to talented but poor children from the nearby countryside. The project started by that family developed into a whole system of scholarships, sponsored by many other local people. Thanks to this initiative, one of the scholarship-holders, a young female student, will continue her education in Britain.

Wishing all of you a Merry Christmas, I would like to turn your attention to the initiatives that can help Polish (and other) children not only to eat and go but to learn and stay in their local communities, and to help many other people, after achieving a higher social and economic position for themselves. Let the candlelight of Christmas shine and warm up our life and the life of our neighbors – throughout the whole year to come.

(„THE POLISH PANORAMA”, Edmonton, AB, Canada)